PA-18 Special Election - Lamb by a nose (user search)
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  PA-18 Special Election - Lamb by a nose (search mode)
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Author Topic: PA-18 Special Election - Lamb by a nose  (Read 197878 times)
Oryxslayer
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« on: January 24, 2018, 07:56:12 PM »

Saw a bunch of Conor Lamb signs today. No sign of Saccone. This guy is running a very quiet campaign.

Always take anecdotes like this with a grain of salt, hell Saccone could have a huge following in the southern rural areas, but you only are seeing the Lamb suburbs.

On the other hand, Saconnes campaign appears to be a 'this seat is R+11 and Trump won by 20, I can't lose' kind of deal.
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #1 on: February 19, 2018, 05:21:42 PM »

Neither Lamb nor Saccone live in the new PA-14 which is the Heir to PA-18. That said, I'm not sure PA requires congressmen to live in their districts - there is no national requirement for it. Saccone lives in Elizabeth township in South Allegheny, if he wins, he is fine. He is close enough to the district that he shouldn't need to move if there are no residency requirements, and moving shouldn't be a hassle if needed since the district is just a few miles away. Lamb on the other hand lives in Mt Lebanon, which is now in PA-17. If he wins, he has to challenge Rothfus to stay in congress.
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #2 on: February 27, 2018, 03:21:16 PM »


I disagree with them about the move, but they got a nice editorial here:

http://cookpolitical.com/analysis/house/pennsylvania-house/pa-18-special-election-moves-lean-republican-toss
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #3 on: March 03, 2018, 10:59:43 PM »

Lamb says he's in favor of the tariffs.
FF Move. If I were in this district, my vote for him would have been secured.

Both candidates are pro-tariff which honestly is probably for the best in a seat like this. PA-18 has a hard labor/union tradition, and will probably oppose any candidate that did come out in favor of extreme free trade and the job losses that come with it.

The problem for Lamb though is that he is looking like he is going to be the 2018 nominee for the new PA-17, no matter whether he wins or loses. PA-17, the new one, is almost a near opposite of PA-18 on trade. The north Pittsburg suburbs will not stand for a pro-tarrif candidate, so Lamb will have to do a hard flip at least on this issue.
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #4 on: March 05, 2018, 12:04:08 PM »

Btw, if Conor wins (Which looks likelier by the day) he becomes the favorite to challenge Toomey in 2022.


Ehhh.... Post-2020/2022 redistricting one of (new) PA-07, PA-08, PA-17, and obviously PA-10 are going to become less friendly to the Dems due to a neighboring R seat getting chopped. Whoever finds themselves without a seat probably challenges Toomey 100% of the time. So perhaps it will be Lamb, but he may settle in and we see Cartwright take up the banner in 2022. Except for the PA-07 guy, they all seem like fine candidates.
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #5 on: March 05, 2018, 08:46:01 PM »


You dropped this -> /s
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #6 on: March 10, 2018, 08:39:08 PM »

Wait, his name is pronounced "Suh-CONE"? I always thought it was "SAH-co-nay".

Sack-cone here :/
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #7 on: March 10, 2018, 09:03:28 PM »

For posterity's sake, I decided to break down the counties for the district in DRA. Under the "current" coalition system, we see that Allegheny is far to the left of the District as a whole, and the Westmoreland and Greene bits are far to the right. Washington is just a little right of the district as a whole. Allegheny is about 20k pop over the Westmoreland+Greene total pop, so they roughly balance out. Under the older number though, the areas south of Allegheny have more affinity for the democrats, and the south Allegheny suburbs comparatively less.



Something to note is that under the 2011 Gerrymander, the Pubs carved out the more 'ancestral' democratic communities along the river borders in the south and stuck them in PA-09, (in exchange for more of Westmoreland) a move that was done out of fear that this region still could vote blue. We will see on Tuesday if these lines succeeded or failed in their attempt to lock out Democrats.
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #8 on: March 11, 2018, 01:32:51 PM »


Check out the end of page 34/beginning of 35 for discussion on this paper, if/when lamb loses, it won't be because of this. Apparently, this was one of the papers that was bullish for Trump.
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #9 on: March 11, 2018, 04:50:04 PM »

Supremely hottake:

- A Connor Lamb win does not mean that democrats will take the house.
- A Connor Lamb loss does not mean that democrats will not take the house.

Though I would argue that a Lamb win would make it significantly harder for Republicans to argue against the odds of a Democratic takeover.

This is an exceptional area, having such a Democratic heritage that it was both +20 Mondale in 1984 and +40 Trump in 2016.  A Lamb win would boost candidates like Ojeda and the Dems running in the Obama-Trump Upstate NY districts significantly, but it says next to nothing about e.g. the Romney-Clinton CDs.  

That having been said, if they are winning back this kind of seat, there is an all Midwest/Rust Belt path to a Dem House majority out there.  

shrug* If lamb wins, it will be because the highly educated suburbs in Allegheny pulled him over the top, not the southern areas returning to the fold. Which largely lines up with what we are seeing in federal special and regular elections - a dem over-performance everywhere but more tied to suburbs/urban zones and education levels.


Also, the main reason for my post, Cohn's got a nice map with data:

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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #10 on: March 11, 2018, 05:07:17 PM »

I'm just also going to note that the south of this district isn't even Obama-trump territory...its more like Gore-Kerryish-Tepid McCain-Romney-Hard Trump. Like its hard to remember but this PA-12 in 2000 was drawn as a Dem pack to make that years PA-18 safe-R, but by 2010 is was a Tossup seat won by McCain. Even though these counties maintain a strong dem registration advantage, they have been moving right for quite some time.

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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #11 on: March 11, 2018, 05:15:59 PM »

What benchmarks are yall looking for Lamb to squeeze out a victory?

I am thinking:

Allegheny: Lamb needs to get just shy of 60% here
Westmoreland: I would say 44% would be a good minimum, could get away with a bit lower though.
Washington: Around 46% would be good, preferred a little higher
Greene: Around 43-44% ought to do the trick.

What do yall think?

Probably less in Westmoreland, the county barely plurality D by the registration count in contrast to the rest of the region. Probably more Washington, the county is 2 points to the right of the district as a whole, and has a small mix of olds school dems and highly educated voters
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #12 on: March 11, 2018, 07:39:09 PM »


Seeing that in your signature made me wonder: what if the same person could represent more than one district at the same time?  Indeed, is there any reason this wouldn't be legal already?  A representative doesn't have to reside within their district.  So in theory, an extremely popular figure might run for two (or more!) districts in the same vicinity in the same election, win more than one, and have more than one vote in the House, one for each district represented.

Don't most states prohibit being on the ballot for multiple offices, unless one of them is President or Vice President?

I'm also sure there is something against holding multiple offices at the same time, despite the fact that this has been push several time (Huey Long anyone?). I know in distant past young democracies often saw national figures elected to multiple constituencies, like Lamartine in 1848 France, though they mostly only choose 1 to represent.
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #13 on: March 11, 2018, 07:41:06 PM »

We're supposedly due for snow here in the Mid-Atlantic on Tuesday. Any idea how, if it all, it could affect the election? To me it sounds like it would favor Saccone.

Pretty much 0 early vote, so everyone depends on same day voting. Which in turn depends really about who has the better ground game.
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #14 on: March 12, 2018, 09:05:41 AM »

Because we have a lot of stickied threads, I'm thinking that on Tuesday I unsticky this one and conversation will migrate to the Congressional Results thread, where eventually it will peter out. What do people think?

I figured the general primary thread would replace this ones sticky spot after 3/13.
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #15 on: March 13, 2018, 08:28:04 AM »

Finally woke up and I'm currently in the middle of the Nor'Eastern, so I'm going to be here all day. But since its the final day, I give a concluding thought.

As we have known for a while, there are very few takeaways from this election. It is only one house seat, on a map that is vanishing. If Lamb wins, then he probably eliminates of of Rothfus's non-monetary incumbency advantage for his challenge to PA-17, with an open PA-14. If Saccone wins, then PA-14 isn't open, but Lamb is still challenging Rothfus - so does it matter?

However, one thing that still hold true, and probably explains why this race became so close, is that the parties really need to ensure good Candidate recruitment. Excluding the controversial torture stuff, Saccone has a excellent resume that would lock up many types of congressional seats. However, as Wasserman states, the best and historically victorious candidates tend to have life stories that are harmonious with the district, regardless of ideology. Saccone lacks the working class  reputation that still flows through the seat, and instead has a more Allegheny-suburban one. His Pro-RTW past probably matched these Republican suburbs - and would match many other parts of the country, but here they sent the still strong Unions against him.

The defending party loves to say that they have candidates who know their district and can localize the race the prevent defeat. However, these special elections have shone that Democrats have a great bench of B - tier candidates who match their seat, while Republicans are struggling with C and D tier candidates that don't match their seats (or F like Moore).
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #16 on: March 13, 2018, 08:57:50 AM »

Thank you JMC for the map template.

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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #17 on: March 13, 2018, 10:11:32 AM »


Twitter is a cruel place for the proper Atlas colors.
im still fairly new here and I gotta ask; why are dems red and reps blue? just cause? It threw me off for a bit when I first got here

This site existed before the two parties formalized their colors post-Florida, when the media was referring to blue/red counties.
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #18 on: March 13, 2018, 12:20:28 PM »



NYT is going to have a nice precinct by precinct map for the needle later. Overall, I say Lamb under-preforms in Westmoreland, and over-preforms south of Allegheny in comparison to the base projection.
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #19 on: March 13, 2018, 12:21:59 PM »

Also, the NYT live page is up:

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/03/13/us/elections/results-pennsylvania-house-special-election.html
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #20 on: March 13, 2018, 02:54:13 PM »

Polls close at 8pm EDT.  About what time should results start coming in?

NYT says around 8:20 first results. Also virtually 0 early voting in PA, so what we should be seeing is final.
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #21 on: March 13, 2018, 04:10:19 PM »

I can't help but think that Lamb needs more out of Allegheny if Westmoreland is keeping pace with it, but we will see in a few hours...
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #22 on: March 13, 2018, 04:59:53 PM »

If I was Lamb right now, I would be feeling very confident.

I want Lamb to win, but it would be really funny to see how much crow you will have to eat after the past week if Saccone wins. Smiley
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #23 on: March 13, 2018, 05:23:54 PM »

Here’s a random question

Has a party that holds national power ever won in a “big upset” special election?

Like, let’s say in a Massachusetts election with trump as prez, a republican knocked off a Democrat for a debate or house race.

Has something like that ever happened?



Kathy Hochul in 2011?

Best example I can think of

Yeah these things have happened in the past, the tend to usually be because of scandal with the 'expected' party, pushing the defending party to victory.
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Oryxslayer
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« Reply #24 on: March 13, 2018, 05:50:00 PM »

I don’t know why, I just can’t bring myself to care as much about this race as I did ga 6 or the Kansas race

Maybe it’s because there will be another election at end of year in this district, maybe because I like Conor lamb and think he is actually pretty centrist or right leaning



I get that feeling as well, and I am fairly confident it is because there is no scandal or overwhelming pressure forced upon the race. Georgia was the outside dems wanting to send a message. Kansas was Brownback. Montana was Assultforte. Alabama was Moore's diddling. When a scandal or outside controversy seizes control of a special campaign, the race becomes more then D v R. If Moore won then Rs would be seen as supporting pedophilia for example. If ot doesn't though, than it is just a (relatively) sleepy special, like South Carolina, Utah, and now this.
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